Nanotroopers Episode 19: Mount Kipwezi

by Philip Bosshardt

  ***ANAD assuming C-85…molecule barrier at tightlink mesh…now forming structures…please provide bearing***

  Winger commanded ANAD to form up the barrier surface of the mask right where he was. As the other nanotroopers watched, a small semi-spherical ‘helmet’ materialized in mid-air, and Winger inserted his head through the formation, until his face was completely obscured. When the config was done, Winger’s head was fully enveloped in a fine mesh of tightly linked nanobots. A small photon lens directed outside views straight to his eyes.

  “I’m going in to see if I can find out what happened. Keep your eyes open in case our friends re-appear.” With that Winger waded out into the swamp until he was chest deep in the turbid water, then sank out of sight.

  Barnes stood on the mud spit of a shore, shaking her head. “Sometimes I think the Major’s actually part ANAD himself.”

  Singh had to admire Winger’s skill. “The best code and stick man in the whole Battalion. He can make ANAD do anything. Who knew there even was a config for a respiration mask?”

  Beneath the surface of the swamp, Winger found he could ‘see’ nothing. The swamp was dark and turgid with the silt. He reached the bottom, kicked out and stumbled his way along for a moment, feeling with hands and feet for anything that seemed out of the ordinary. That’s a tree stump…that’s something that died…ugh…that’s some rocks…

  He saw a faint glow even in the turbid fog and moved toward it. The glow became stronger, like car headlamps in fog. Now a pronounced swirl developed. There was a definite flow of current along the bottom here. Silt and sediment obscured the glow for a while, but when he nearly stumbled over the Sphere, he sucked in his breath and spun away to keep from coming into contact with the thing.

  It’s another Sphere, all right, he told himself. He’d almost touched it too. But the glow from the bottom and the faint vortex of the water, made it clear where the device rested. Somehow, in ways he didn’t understand, the Red Hammer agents had known or found the Sphere and used to go someplace or some time else.

  He knew the nanotroopers would have to do the same. And the prospect made him nervous for any attempt was fraught with risk. No one at Quantum Corps really understood how the Spheres worked.

  Had Red Hammer figured them out? Could the cartel use the Sphere to visit other times and places, ransack them for useable gadgets and come back to their own time?

  It made his head hurt just to think about it.

  Winger surfaced and stroked his way to the shore. He described what he had found.

  “The only way we’re going to be able to get back, or follow our targets is to go under water and contact the Sphere together, the way we did before.”

  Barnes made a point. “We left our ANAD masters at the camp, Skipper. The barrier nano. We can’t configure masks like you did.”

  “I’ll have to be your eyes. “Hold your breath when we go under, hold on to me and I’ll direct your hands to be near the Sphere. When I give the word, we all contact the surface together.” He looked around the dense steaming jungle. Reflections from nearby fires made a blood-red glow on the underside of the low clouds. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

  The four of them waded back out into the swamp, shoving rotted-out branches and logs away as they stroked toward the small eddies that marked the Sphere’s location.

  At the spot, Winger commanded ANAD to button up his respirator mask. His face disappeared behind a shield of twinkling mist.

  “On my mark, we submerge…ready….three…two…one…Now!”

  The four nanotroopers dropped straight to the bottom and remained stationary, per Winger’s instructions. One by one, Winger grabbed a hand until he had solid contact with the other three. A few meters away, a strong pearlescent glow emanated from the Sphere, diffuse and scattered in the dark water, but still visible to Winger.

  Hiroshi squinted through the turbid silt to judge their position for herself. This really is nuts, she told herself.

  Winger carefully positioned each trooper around the perimeter of the Sphere, placing their legs and arms just so. Then he took each trooper’s hand, held them in his own, and lowered them carefully toward the Sphere’s surface.

  Whether it was a stray current or it was the way they had made contact, the troopers soon found out they had done something terribly wrong…

  …first came the dizzying carnival ride, like riding a roller coaster flipped on its side that never seemed to end…hurtling at breakneck speed down a curving corridor, flitting at insane speeds past a roaring river of polygons and cubes and tetrahedrals and dodecahedrons and things that had no name until at last, each trooper came to a hard landing right on their butt and sat still for a few moments, while the whirling tape reel of images gradually spun down and the world finally turned right side up.

  It was Winger who realized, as soon as his head stopped spinning, that they had not returned to Kokul-Gol at all.

  It took a minute for Winger to gather his senses. He heard shouts—clearly, there were people around this time. Guttural shouts, hoarse and angry, almost growls. Something flashed through the air by his head and he ducked involuntarily. Rolling away from the disturbance, he saw through bleary eyes a face…it was Mighty Mite Barnes. Singh was there too and Hiroshi behind him.

  They’d all made it to—where exactly?

  Winger lifted his head, opened his eyes and looked around, stunned at what he saw.

  No longer a tropical forest, they had come to a place of open ground, on a slope. In fact, the Quantum Dawn team had ‘landed’ on the side of a hill. They clung precariously to a slope of loose rock and dirt.

  Below them, voices shouted. Things flew through the air and with a start, Winger realized the things were missiles flying, spears and stones, in a furious onslaught. More voices came from another direction, upslope. More spears and stones came from that direction.

  Barnes lifted her head. “Skipper, where the hell are we?”

  “Right in the middle of a war, it looks like,” Winger told her.

  The team had come to rest on the side of a mountain. Jeez, it looks like the mountains around Engebbe, he muttered to himself. And not just a mountain. A diffuse red glare lit the upper slopes of the hill. They had come to the flanks of an active volcano. A low rumble could be heard and felt through the ground. Streams of loose pebbles cascaded down the slope around them.

  And they were right in the middle of some kind of dispute. As Winger hunkered down, he saw further downslope a small band of…what were they? Gorillas? Small furry hominids? They were slinging spears and rocks at another band of the same type of creatures further upslope. The two bands were in combat.

  And the nanotroopers were caught in the middle.

  “We need a barrier,” Winger thought. “Anybody got a gun?” he yelled out.

  “Lost mine in that roller coaster ride,” Singh replied.

  “I’ve got a mag pistol,” Barnes said, “if I can get it out and loaded.” She fiddled with a leg holster, wriggled the sidearm loose, enabled the charger and clicked it to life. “Working…and loaded!”

  “I’m launching ANAD…maybe Doc II as well!’ Winger said. He cycled open his shoulder port and commanded ANAD to go.

  “Launch now!” he told the Autonomous Nanoscale Assembler/Disassembler. “Configure C-2…max rate. We need some kind of barrier up here!”